If you’re an academic manager, you have probably already thought about and craved the legendary (mythical?) concept of ‘work-life balance’. I don’t need to tell you how hard it can be to be an expert teacher, organiser, counsellor, customer services manager, materials writer and leader all at once. There’s a lot of plate spinning involved and a lot of putting out fires and above all else, a lot of being interrupted.
In fact, Henry Mintzberg (2007), who has spent years studying, writing about and training managers, said that when he came to describing a manager’s job he found that in reality, very little of a manager’s time is spent planning organising and controlling or doing other things that we think managers do – a lot of it is spent getting interrupted and trying to keep your head above water. Does that sound familiar?
Top the interruptions and swimming against the tide of incoming work with the fact that we are usually middle management, meaning that our decision-making powers are limited, and we have a recipe for a frustration and the potential for overwork and overwhelm – far from a balanced life.
Let’s take it as a given that we are vocational workers who believe in doing a good job, so how can we keep doing a good job and achieve that Pinterest-worthy, Instagram-able work-life balance?
It seems the idea of work-life balance and self-care are all over social media. Morning routines with exercise, followed by productive days working steadily through your short to-do list reign. There’s nothing wrong with those things, but we are setting ourselves up for failure and disappointment by imagining that there is a life of harmony and balance we should all aspire to, where we have the time to explore hobbies, nurture relationships, keep our home in check and do an excellent job – all brilliantly, all of the time.
The truth? You can’t. It’s fake. Worse than that, it makes us feel bad: ‘The pursuit of balance is stressing us out’ (Laporte, 2012:316). In her book The Fire Starter Sessions, Danielle Laporte warns against aiming for ‘bogus’ balance. ‘Striving for balance will derail your plans for greatness’ (Laporte, 2012:317).
Our energy and time are finite and where the effort and energy most need to be directed will depend on what is happening at that moment in our lives. There is a useful analogy, which I think is more realistic in terms of what we can expect from ourselves in work and in life: the ‘four-burner theory’. It is not clear where this idea came from, I first heard about it from an organisational YouTuber who had read an article in the New Yorker, by David Sedaris (2009).
He writes about a conversation with a successful businesswoman who also says that true work-life balance is a myth, using the analogy of a hob with limited power to illustrate our limited capacity.
‘One burner represents your family, one is your friends, the third is your health and the fourth is your work.’ The gist, she said, was that in order to be successful you have to cut off one of your burners. And in order to be really successful you have to cut off two.
It’s hard work trying to be and do everything all the time: Mum, partner, colleague, boss, friend, cleaner, cook, organiser, planner, sister, daughter, shoulder to cry one, and so on. My version of the four-burner theory, is slightly adapted, largely because I refuse to cut off any burner completely. Rather than cutting off one burner, I turn one or two down some of the time. I know there are times when I don’t look after myself or my friends as much as I should, because my ‘work burner’ is on high and there isn’t enough gas to go around, but once that dish is prepared, I can turn it down to a simmer and focus on catching up with the bits that were half prepped on the side. When my family need me, the other burners go down low for a while, until the crisis is averted, the dish is served – and we are ready for the next meal.
I’ve been an academic manager for nearly 15 years and, as a result, there are one or two things I have learnt about looking after myself and creating a more balanced (but not totally balanced) life along the way.
- Changing my mindset. Personally, I work lots because I like working! I’m not a workaholic, but I like to feel valued and useful and to be productive. I want to be in a team, figuring things out, working hard, deserving my holidays, paying taxes, looking after people and generating work and value for others. So, it isn’t about waiting for work to finish in order to live; it’s about enjoying work and recognising that work can be a positive thing.
- In the early days I worked over the edge of my healthy limits: long days, long hours, stress and a sedentary job exacerbated a list of health problems that still plague me now. Now, I am clearer about my limits and I have learnt to stop working into the night. I should have made shifts to look after my health sooner. Health really is number one.
- Make small changes but make them habits that you can live with. This means building healthier habits in your day-to-day. For me this has been: walking my son to school every day (I leave the phone at home for that walk.); drinking fermented drinks every day; and using a ‘pomodoro’ timer to make myself move about every half an hour and go and refill my water (checking some classrooms on the way).
- Ask for help. I made the critical mistake of doing everything all the time in a bid to prove how competent and great I was in my early years of academic management. What happens to the managers that show they are capable and never complain? They are given more work. They are not given support. Then I watched in amazement as new people came along and said things like: ‘I didn’t know I had to do that’ or ‘I’m very busy with X, I won’t be able to do Y’ or ‘I will need someone else to do that, it’s not a good use of my time’. So, I eventually learnt that it’s OK to set boundaries and it’s OK to say what you need, you’re unlikely to get it otherwise.
- We can’t change what needs doing; we can change what we prioritise and how we react to it. Prioritising and long-term planning have been key elements in feeling less overwhelmed at work and being more able to leave work at work in my experience.
- Be realistic and know that there will be times when your family need you. If you are lucky, your family will support your pursuit of your vocation, but take care to notice when they need you and set the example to your team of looking after your family when it counts.
- There will be times when you need your friends, so don’t lose contact with them and invest in friendships.
In short, instead of trying to be everything at 110% at all times, it is worth remembering ‘nothing blooms all year round’, so be kind and patient with yourself. The pursuit of balance can leave us feeling disheartened and resenting our jobs. By accepting that we have moments to bloom, moments to sow seeds and moments to harvest, we are more likely to have brighter blooms when it counts.
References
Laporte, D. (2012). The Fire Starter Sessions: A soulful and practical guide to creating success on your own terms. Harmony Books.
Mintzberg, H. (2007). Mintzberg on Management: Inside our strange world of organizations. Free Press.
Sedaris, D. (2009). ‘Laugh, Kookaburra’. The New Yorker. Available from https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/08/24/laugh-kookaburra (Last accessed 30 October 2024).
Fari Greenaway is an experienced academic manager, manager trainer, teacher trainer, author and school inspector, committed to fostering reflective practice among EFL educators. Through workshops and her Instagram (@farigreenaway) she empowers professionals to refine their skills and drive excellence in language teaching. From teacher to academic director, with nearly 20 years’ experience in English language teaching, 15 of those in academic management, Fari currently oversees a team of nine academic managers across five academies, managing 59 teachers and 3,000 students.
